Rants & Raves: GOP protects wealthy

Thu, Apr 19, 2012 @ 6:33 am
| updated Thu, Apr 19, 2012 @ 7:44 am

The first time I heard the phrase, "The happy slave syndrome" was in response to the Republican-led opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment for Women. Republican Phyllis Schlafly was organizing votes to defeat the amendment. She was accused by those for equal rights for women as having the Happy Slave Syndrome. She liked her subservient status and didn't want to rock the boat.

I'm hearing it again in response to the Republican opposition to raising taxes on those making over a million dollars. They don't mind postal workers or forest rangers losing pay or retirement benefits, just don't ask anything of their leaders, the wealthy. We middle class cannot do this all by ourselves.

Not all millionaires and billionaires are job creators. If that were so, we would be drowning in jobs. If postal workers and forest rangers can be asked to contribute more, so can they.

Cleaner fuelThe newspaper said that one of the reasons that our gas prices are so high is that a lot of our refineries have to shut down so that they can set up to make a cleaner burning fuel for the spring and summer season. So, does this mean that after the spring and summer months, they have to shut down again so that they can make a dirtier burning fuel for the fall and winter season?

Wouldn't it be better for our environment to just have the cleaner burning fuel all the time? The refineries wouldn't have to shut down, our gas prices would be lower and we all could breathe a little cleaner air.

To rant or rave about something, go to Jacksonville.com's Opinion menu and select Rants & Raves; email rantsandraves@jacksonville.com; or drop items at the Times-Union office at 1 Riverside Ave.

Many of the posters make good points about our social safety nets being abused and valid points that safety nets beget more users who grow up expecting the government to take care of them. However there is a large number of hard working, low paid, and often even well educated people who can't get ahead because there are no jobs that pay well enough for them to support themselves and their families. Its easy to blame them for their condition and presume its their own fault and that way you can sit back and feel superior. Today I see law school graduates that can't find jobs, engineers unemployed for years, and college grads working at fast food establishments. High school grads have little hope of getting a reasonable job when all of the manufacturing has fled the country, and all that remains are low paid service jobs where they compete with illegal immigrants, and the laid-off college educated.

The trick is, how do we get rid of the abuse but still maintain the safety net for those who would work if the jobs were available.

Liberals, I was wondering if you miss being able to think for yourselves. Well I guess you wouldn't know since you can't think for yourselves. It seems all you can spout is the same old stale talking points. PLEASE come up with some new rhetoric.

By the way, when it comes to bad mouthing the "evil rich" - we might want to consider how many of the saintly poor in our country are providing jobs for others.

Redaf
A lot of us lazy *** liberals have jobs and have had them for more than 40 years-during that time, we also managed to get enough education that we found other sources of news than Hannity, Glen Beck, Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Fox News etc. Is it true that studies have shown you will be smarter knowing absolutely nothing about current affairs than using Fox News as your window on the world? Reading your posts, that appears to be true.

Annie1-I do not have hatred for the American Dream-I have disdain for corporate socialism-to you use parameters, you obviously have a seething hatred for the workers of America, which obviously means you believe in fascism. Not so nice when the insults are turned around, is it. And on the servers, who is going to guarantee the $9.98 an hour-the tips make up the difference, the big employers get a reduction from $4.64 to $2.13 an hour-should we depend on our Republican state legislators that passed a law that made it illegal for Miami to have a mediation program for workers to try to recover earned wages from employers that deliberately failed to pay their workers minimum wage? They are going to guarantee employers make up the difference? We are going to depend on our legislators when the employers commits wage fraud? Really, Annie1, really?

SayNoToTebow: I can afford to do all of my shopping at Publix but refuse to pay their outrageous prices for brand name products. So I shop at Wal-Mart for those items. I also shop at Target. You are probably one of those people who vote against their own best interests just because there's an R after the name on the ballot. You sit in judgment upon everyone else, and I wouldn't trust that judgment as far as I could throw it. You should try listening to someone else besides those airheads on Fox.

So now, let the name calling begin - that's all some of you folks know how to do.